This past Saturday, Iowa State allowed only 53 points in a win over Kansas. That same day, West Virginia scored 93 on their home court in a win over Oklahoma. Those two teams, one who put on a defensive masterclass and the other who couldn’t miss this past weekend will meet up in Morgantown on Wednesday night.
No. 11 Iowa State ranks first in the Big 12 in total defense. The Cyclones are allowing 61.0 points per game this season, while also forcing the most turnovers per game in the Big 12 this season, while also ranking first in turnover margin.
“Offensively, the run good stuff, so they don’t put themselves in bad positions in transition,” West Virginia head coach Bob Huggins said. “They’re a really good transition defensive team, so everybody has to play against their set defense. And they’ve got shot blockers.”
Conversely, West Virginia scored 18 fastbreak points against the Sooners Saturday, while they also had fifth-year guard Erik Stevenson go for a career-high 34 points, making 13 of 23 shots, with six of those makes coming from three-point range.
“I’m sure they’re going to put an emphasis on guarding him,” Huggins said of Stevenson. “They’ll probably switch everything, they’ll probably try to take him to the loaded side of the floor.”
West Virginia guard Joe Toussaint believes the Mountaineers have to want it more than the Cyclones to come out on top Wednesday night.
“It’s just going to be who wants it more, that’s all it is,” Toussaint said. “I’m just going to preach to the guys, we want it more. From here on out we want every game more than everybody else.”
Toussaint is a newcomer to the Mountaineer program, but has history against this Iowa State team playing against them when he was at the University of Iowa.
“Definitely using my knowledge from there. One thing about them, they don’t like pressure,” Toussaint said. “I feel like we can really pressure them tomorrow, turn them over.”
Gabe Kalscheur of the Cyclones is one of the players Toussaint knows well. This season, Kalscheur is averaging 13.2 points per game, 2.4 rebounds per game, and has 54 steals on the season.
“He’s a really good shooter, he can put it on the floor,” Toussaint said of Kalscheur. “He’s a really good defender as well. I feel like they’re all really good shooters. They all make shots, they all play hard and that’s just a common theme around all them.”
As of late West Virginia has found some sort of a rhythm after an 0-5 start to Big 12 play. The Mountaineers have won four of their past six games, including two wins against teams ranked inside the top-15 at the time. West Virginia is scoring 80.8 points per game in those four wins, while averaging only 66.5 points in their two losses.
Toussaint said though that it starts with getting stops on the defensive end, before trying to score the ball on offense.
“When you get stops it’s easier to score, when you don’t get stops that’s when you start to panic,” Toussaint said. “When we get stops we all just play freely.”
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